Nose weight is a very important consideration for a caravan. It’s importance is to do with safety and stability. It’s the weight measured at the hitch pushing down on the tow bar.

The maximum nose weight for a Freedom Jetstream is 50kg, the minimum 25kg.

From a safety point of view the nose weight mustn’t exceed the lower of the two values of either caravan nose weight or tow bar nose weight. Equally though it’s undesirable to have too little nose weight, for stability reasons, hence the minimum figure I stated earlier. My tow bar has a slightly higher figure so 50kg is my maximum on this outfit.

In order to measure this downward force or weight, you need some device such as scales or a gauge, I opted to purchase a Milenco gauge built for this purpose.

It’s then a simple case of lifting the jockey wheel (after the steadies are raised) high enough to place the gauge under the hitch and then lower the jockey wheel again to put the weight of the caravan onto it.

As you can see I’m at 30kg, so I might perhaps add things to the front locker (my wheel and hitch locks were not in at the time of the measurement), or try and bring the heavy items slightly more forward inside the caravan. That way I’ll have the confidence that the Freedom will tow at its safest and most stable fashion on the next trip.